Animals, thoughts and concepts

Abstract

There are three main positions on animal thought: lingualism denies that non-linguistic animals have any thoughts; mentalism maintains that their thoughts differ from ours only in degree, due to their different perceptual inputs; an intermediate position, occupied by common sense and Wittgenstein, maintains that animals can have thoughts of a simple kind. This paper argues in favor of an intermediate position. It considers the most important arguments in favor of lingualism, namely those inspired by Davidson: the argument from the intensional nature of thought (Section 1); the idea that thoughts involve concepts (Sections 2-3); the argument from the holistic nature of thought (Section 4); and the claim that belief requires the concept of belief (Sections 5-6). The last argument (which Davidson favors) is uncompelling, but the first three shed valuable light on the extent to which thought requires language. However, none of them precludes animals from having simple thoughts. Even if one adopts the kind of third-person perspective on thought Davidson shares with Wittgenstein, the result is a version of the intermediate position, albeit one enriched by Davidson's insights concerning intensionality, concepts and holism (Section 7). We can only ascribe simple thoughts to animals, and even that ascription is incongruous in that the rich idiom we employ has conceptual connections that go beyond the phenomena to which it is applied. © 2000 Kluwer Academic Publishers.